US billionaires got $434 billion richer during the pandemic, according to report

• US billionaires saw a major boost in net worth in the first two months of the coronavirus pandemic, according to a new report published on Thursday by the left-leaning think tanks Americans for Tax Fairness and the Institute for Policy Studies.
• According to the report, the total net worth of all US billionaires got a $434 billion boost since March 19, when many US states were placed on lockdown.
• In total, the roughly 600 US billionaires saw their wealth grow from $2.948 trillion to $3.382 trillion within the past two months.
• The report comes as the number of Americans who filed for unemployment benefits continues to grow.

While many Americans are facing financial hardship due to the coronavirus outbreak, US billionaires saw a boost in net worth in the first two months of the pandemic, according to a new report.

According to the report, published on Thursday by the left-leaning think tanks Americans for Tax Fairness and the Institute for Policy Studies, the total net worth of all US billionaires got a $434 billion boost since March 19, when many US states were placed on lockdown.

According to Forbes, 623 billionaires live in the US, including Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg, investor Warren Buffett, and Oracle founder Larry Ellison. The report indicates that just those top five billionaires saw their wealth increase by a total of $75.5 billion, or 19%.

In total, the roughly 600 US billionaires saw their wealth grow from $2.948 trillion to $3.382 trillion within the past two months.

"The pandemic has revealed the deadly consequences of America's yawning wealth gap, and billionaires are the glaring symbol of that economic inequality," Americans for Tax Fairness executive director Frank Clemente said in the report, which advocates for closing tax loopholes for the wealthy.

"Post-pandemic, the rich and corporations must begin to pay their fair share of taxes so we can build a society that works for everyone, not just billionaires and others at the top," Clemente added.

The report comes as the number of Americans who filed for unemployment benefits continues to grow. On Wednesday, the US weekly jobless claims hit 2.4 million, bringing the nine-week total to nearly 39 million.

Markets Insider reporter Saloni Sardana previously noted that research by Forbes indicated that US billionaires' wealth declined slightly from $3.1 trillion in 2019 to $2.9 trillion in 2020 as of March 18, though new reports indicate their wealth has since rebounded.